Cure for the Common Cancer
by rslhilson
Summary: In which Wilson develops a cold, and existential discussions ensue. H/W friendship; slash goggles optional.


_Cure for the Common Cancer_

**Spoilers: **Cancer arc, including the finale._  
_

**Author's Note: **Based on my own Memorial Day weekend at Cape Cod, the Cure!Wilson challenge at Camp Sick!Wilson, and a recent study on the cold virus attacking cancer cells (you can Google it for more details, but I took huge leaps/creative license with the science behind this and apologize to anyone who's big on medical accuracy!).

* * *

Cape Cod was a beautiful place.

Wilson used to come here with his family in the warmer months – Memorial Day weekends, or longer chunks in the summer when his father could get out of work. The beaches were gorgeous, though it'd been hard to truly appreciate the glimmering waters and elegant jetties as a 10-year-old boy. Most of his fond memories involved building sandcastles with Danny, or going into town with his mother for ice-cream.

It hadn't come as much of a surprise when he'd asked House if they could make the trip up here, one last favor in a long line of last favors. They'd returned from their life on the road when his decline had become noticeable – increasing chest pain, an annoying cough that wouldn't go away – and Wilson wanted to do things while he still could.

So House had found a rental online, a fully-furnished beachfront looking straight out at the ocean, and now here they were. Of course Wilson had developed a sore throat the night before their trip, which had expanded to include a slight fever along the drive. By the time they'd made it to their destination, he was completely congested and thoroughly miserable.

But House had come prepared, as he always did. Wilson's usual pain pills and oxygen tanks had been packed along with all sorts of other drugs, and House wasted no time in sending Wilson to bed with cold meds shoved down his throat.

"Cancer wasn't enough?" House muttered as he measured out a dose of Robitussin.

They both knew it wasn't unexpected – crappy immune system, fatigue, yadda yadda. Still, Wilson couldn't help but feel a good old-fashioned sense of Wilson guilt.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, as House tucked the blankets around him.

"You're feverish," was House's reply, and the lights in the bedroom flickered off.

* * *

"_Ah…ah…ah-CHOO._"

"Jesus. Maybe you'll sneeze the tumor right out of your chest."

Wilson blew his nose – a loud, honking sound. "I believe 'bless you' would be the appropriate phrase."

"'Jesus' was close enough."

House had gone out for groceries in the morning, returning to find that Wilson had somehow maneuvered himself from the bedroom to the living room couch. He wasn't happy with the lack of blankets, of course, but he quickly remedied that while Wilson pretended to be annoyed at all the fuss. The floor-to-ceiling windows offered a beautiful view of the ocean, and while Wilson wished he had the strength to tread his toes through the sand, he was content, for now, to look out at the distant waves and rest.

Finally satisfied that he'd buried Wilson in enough quilts, House waved an empty mug in front of him. "If I make tea, are you just gonna throw it up?"

"Tea would be nice, actually," Wilson admitted.

"I thought your parents taught you to say 'please' and 'thank you.'" But House limped away nonetheless, still keeping his eye on Wilson as he set the water boiling and puttered around for teabags and honey. To his quiet approval, the kitchen and living room of the house were adjoined, not unlike their setup back home in Princeton.

_Home. _As if he'd ever find himself back there – not that he cared. And he always felt more at home whenever Wilson was around, anyway.

…Jesus. All this best-friend-dying crap was practically castrating him_._

The sound of coughing rose over the bubbling of the water. House gripped the kitchen counter as his own lungs seemed to constrict, but in truth, there was a strange sense of comfort in the illusion of change. Wilson's hacking cough still said _sickness _and _misery, _but at least that followed from a progression of _rhinovirus _and _fluids _and _rest _and _get better, _which was infinitely more tolerable than the other progressions that had stemmed from Wilson's normal (God, when had this become _normal_?) coughing.

House hobbled back to his patient, setting the tea on the coffee table and pushing the box of tissues closer within Wilson's reach. "You want the oxygen?"

Wilson shook his head, grasping the mug handle and taking a sip to steady himself. "I'm okay. It's just a cold, House."

Right. As if the universe hadn't also taken a massive dump in Wilson's chest.

Wilson seemed to read his mind. "You know what I mean," he sighed dismissively, and moved his gaze back to the windows.

They stayed quiet for a while, watching the waves fall in and out of the shoreline. Pretending to be focused on a seagull that had just snatched away another's crustacean lunch, House allowed his eyes to stray to the couch, where Wilson was absently rubbing his chest.

"You should go in for another scan," House said, after a moment.

Wilson looked up in surprise, his hand falling back to his side in an almost self-conscious attempt to prove his innocence. Brown eyes held the blue, sharing sadness and truth.

Finally, Wilson said, "It might be nice to sit outside, by the ocean."

Sadness and truth, and understanding.

It would do Wilson good anyway, House knew. The fresh air would bring some color back to his cheeks, and the salty mist would help clear his lungs. They'd just have to bundle him up to Eskimo status to avoid the chill in the breeze.

House squeezed Wilson's shoulder, and left to get the fold-up deck chairs that Wilson had packed into the trunk of the Volvo.

* * *

They were pathetic, the two of them. House had one hand grasping two chair handles and the other gripping Wilson's waist, while Wilson's own arms were saved for balance and support as he leaned on his friend – his crippled, cane-less friend, House had wasted no time in reminding him. No time for canes when he was also struggling to drag furniture and human beings across an annoying stretch of sand.

When they finally made it to the shoreline, collapsed into the most uncomfortable deck chairs imaginable, House was ready for a long, permanent nap.

A sneeze brought him back to his senses, and he pulled a crumpled wad of tissues out of his pocket. "Here. They're clean."

Wilson wrinkled his nose at the sight, though he took them anyway. "Clean, my ass."

"Not 'til you clean mine."

The last of the summer heat had yet to subside back in Jersey, but here, the wind was the beach's natural air conditioner. House had managed to stuff an annoyed Wilson into a Northface, while a light fall jacket sufficed for himself. Wilson tucked his hands into the soft pockets and leaned back in the old chair, his hair rustling in the ocean breeze.

"Danny and I built an incredible sandcastle here once," he said. "It was huge. Towers, windows, a moat, the works. All the other families on the beach hated us."

"Size matters," House pointed out. "Mine totally would've been bigger than yours."

Wilson ignored him, continuing. "When the tide came close enough to tear it down, I was so upset. But Danny, he just sat there. Like nothing he'd worked for had mattered at all." He turned to House, his expression softening. "What would you have done in your last five months?" he asked.

House's gaze didn't waver at the sudden question. "They wouldn't _be_ my last five months."

"Say it's metastatic, stage IV, chemo's as effective as you trying not to be an ass. Humor me, House."

House shrugged, relenting. "It'd probably be five months of booze and sex. And _you_, I guess, unless you want to just include yourself in the latter."

"Why even bother asking?" Wilson muttered.

"God only knows."

"Are we back to mocking my beliefs now?"

"Didn't realize we'd ever stopped." House glanced over at Wilson, his expression attempting seriousness. "You still gonna tell me that we're not just bags of chemicals?"

"I can't prove it; you can't disprove it. What's the point in trying?"

House shrugged again. "No point. It's just interesting."

"Suddenly you're _interested _in existential ponderings?"

"I'm insulted, Wilson. There's plenty about irrational beliefs in imaginary beings that I find interesting."

Wilson sighed. "Look, House… you believe what you need to believe for you, and I believe what I need to believe for me."

"You don't _need _to believe in anything."

"And yet I do – which tells you something, doesn't it?"

House was about to reply, but Wilson's hand straying to his chest distracted him. Wilson noticed, managing a typical Wilson apologetic smile.

"Sorry – it's nothing. I've actually been feeling a little better."

"The treatment must be working, then. Wait, that's not right…I guess you're being miraculously cured! Praise the Lord!"

"I only meant that the pain isn't as bad as before," Wilson frowned at him. An attempt at a deep breath ended in a harsh fit of coughing, though, and House reached over to pound his back.

"Yeah – you're doing just peachy, Mr. Born-Again Believer. Get it up; you'll feel better."

Wilson finally coughed something unhealthy-looking into a tissue, grimacing as he caught his breath. "God, I hate this cold."

"Cancer, cold – tomato, to-mah-to."

"There _are _good things in this world, too, House. You just never want to acknowledge them."

"Sure I do. Sex, beer, drugs…sex. Did I mention drugs?"

A heavy sigh from Wilson brought on another coughing fit – the salty sea air seemed to be doing its job – and House decided that their existential crisis would have to be put on hold.

"You need another scan, Wilson." He thought about continuing, but something pulled him back to what had started their conversation in the first place. "And if you really wanna know…I'd totally spend my last five months on a motorbike with you. Preferably with some hot blonde chicks in the back."

A shadow of a smile crossed Wilson's face as he turned his gaze back to the water. "It's a beautiful view, isn't it?"

* * *

The clinic was no Princeton-Plainsboro.

Wilson's cold had finally abated, and House had finally dragged him to a clinic on the edge of town – another couple weeks later, but a success was a success. He could admit that Wilson seemed right about feeling better – the cough had subsided, his strength had returned, and House hadn't once seen him rub his chest in pain. But cancer was a tricky bastard, and House would trust Taub alone in a room with a newly-hired nurse before he'd trust Wilson's tumor.

So here they were, in a crowded waiting room full of kids with sprained ankles and people with the sniffles. House had steered Wilson as far from the latter crowd as possible, having no desire to repeat the recent experience of Wilson doped up on cold meds.

"Why _this _clinic?" Wilson asked under his breath. "You drove us all over town, bypassed a million other decent-looking places – "

"_This _place has the hot nurses." House winked at a particular blonde beauty, who rolled her eyes as she passed. "You're seriously gonna complain?"

Wilson sighed heavily, though complain he did not.

He did, however, allow his eyebrows to surge in surprise at the sound of his name.

"James Wilson? We're ready for you."

Wilson turned to House, eyes wide. "I thought we agreed my name was Kyle Calloway," he hissed.

"_My _name is Kyle Calloway," House corrected as they stood, thumping Wilson on the back under the questioning gaze of the nurse who'd called them. "Oh, you, being all forgetful again."

Wilson's meds, House's Vicodin, pulled strings with doctor buds in Cape Cod – turned out Foreman wasn't so boring after all.

* * *

As soon as they returned, Wilson bypassed the front door and headed down the path to the beach. House followed quietly behind, carefully digging his cane into the sand.

He'd let himself fall to his knees if he could.

The waves lapped at their feet. Wilson kicked off his shoes, letting the water brush gently over his toes. At length, House cleared his throat.

"The odds of three false negatives are – "

"Don't. Don't start with the numbers. The only number I've known since this all started is 5 months, and now…" Wilson ran a hand through his hair, eyes fixated on the horizon. "Three scans – _three scans_ –and every one of them was clean."

They'd assumed the first one had simply been an error. The second one had caused Wilson's eyebrows to hit his hairline and House to yell obscenities at Foreman's so-called excellent med school pal. The third one had just left them sitting in silence.

"There's nothing wrong with you," Dr. Walsh had said. "You're absolutely fine."

"Tell your pal Foreman about this and _you _won't be fine," House had whispered out of Wilson's earshot, and dragged Wilson back to the car.

The sound of an apparently angry seagull made House remember that it was his turn to speak. "It could've been the machine," he tried. "That place was a craphole."

"The machine was fine, House, and you know it." Wilson finally turned to him, his expression unreadable. "Are you…do you not want this to be real?"

"Do I not want you to _live_? Is that a rhetorical question or just a stupid one?"

Wilson shook his head. "I'm sorry. This is just…it's a shock for me, too." A smile slowly began to spread across his face, his hands finding a familiar spot on his hips in a stance that House hadn't seen in a long time. "I'm going to be okay, House."

His tentative smile turned into a grin, which was practically a guarantee for House's own smile. Fucking ridiculous. The whole cancer and cold thing had turned him into a sap as it was, but he'd always...

Oh. Oh, Jesus.

"What?" Wilson's joy had come to a slow halt at House's expression. "House, I know that look. What are you going to diagnose me with now?"

"Nothing changed," House murmured. "Nothing changed, except for…"

"Except for _what?_"

"There was a study." House racked his brain, mentally flipping through the countless oncology journals that he'd been reading since Wilson's diagnosis. "The cold virus can use blood cells like a motorbike, ride cross-country on the bloodstream highway 'til it reaches the tumor." House met Wilson's wide-eyed gaze, excited and incredulous all at once. "You got sick, and you cured yourself. I _knew_ you were a magnificent bastard!"

Wilson shook his head in disbelief. "That's insane."

"Y_ou _may have fallen behind in your oncologist duty to stay up-to-date, but _I_ – "

"House, that study was incredibly preliminary. _You _just don't want to accept that this could have been..."

House nodded his head forward, prodding him. "Could have been…what? A _miracle_?"

"Remission just happens sometimes; we both know that."

"Yeah, but there's always a medical reason. Just because we don't know it doesn't mean there isn't one."

"You could say that about God, too, couldn't you?" Wilson pointed out. He was smiling again now, arms hugged around himself as he rocked back on his heels into the cool, squishy sand of the shoreline. "And why couldn't there be a compromise? Why couldn't there be a higher power _and _a medical reason?"

"Did this higher power purposely create a medical reason, or did it just arbitrarily happen under his watch?" House scoffed.

"I don't know, House." Wilson raised his arms in an exaggerated shrug, surrendering. "No one knows – not you, and certainly not me. And I know that's gotta be killing you, but guess what? You don't get to treat it like one of your puzzles to solve. You know why?"

That Wilson smile was making House struggle to keep his own facial muscles in check, and he couldn't help but indulge him. "Why?"

"Because I'm going to be okay. _We _are going to be okay."

Emotions were riding high now, the tears starting to build in Wilson's eyes, and it was one of Those Moments when House would be perfectly happy to turn around, march straight back to the living room, and find some stupid, mindless television show to become completely engrossed in.

At length, though, Wilson got himself in check and grew serious again. "But I guess…you're still…"

"The dead one? Yeah. Ironic, isn't it?"

Wilson grimaced. "I don't suppose you'd want to resurrect yourself."

"I did think about haunting the hospital for a while. Chase would totally shit his pants."

Wilson inhaled deeply, a gift not lost on either of them, but nothing he could think of seemed like it would be particularly helpful. "I'm sorry," he said instead.

House wanted to smack him. "For _living_?"

"You gave up your life for me expecting me to lose mine, and now I'm – "

"Wilson." House moved closer, their eyes locked. "If you _ever_ apologize for this…"

Wilson was the first to break their gaze, nodding slowly. "Okay," he murmured.

House turned back to the ocean, gripping his cane. "I would do it all again," he said quietly. "And you're an idiot if you ever think otherwise."

And when he faced Wilson again, the smile had returned. "So now what, then?" Wilson asked.

House shrugged, finally allowing a smile of his own to come through. "Who knows? Be spontaneous, Wilson."

"Taking a cross-country road trip with a tumor and my dead best friend wasn't spontaneous enough?" Wilson snorted.

It was true, House knew, and their limited five months of spontaneity had just turned into a lifetime. He'd give all four of his limbs and then some to know exactly how and why, but…oh, fuck it. The mysteries of cold viruses and the universe could remain mysteries a little longer.

"You were right," he said at last.

Wilson cocked his head. "About what?"

House nodded towards the sun shining on the horizon, gently toeing off his own shoes and feeling the rush of water over his skin. "It's a beautiful view." He paused, thinking again. "Actually, if this cold virus – "

"_House_."

House turned to look at Wilson's admonishing expression, knowing he was the only one who'd see the secret twinkle in his eyes, the hidden smirk beneath the mask of seriousness.

"I'm not one of your puzzles, remember?"

House smirked. "I figured you out a long time ago, Wilson," he said, and let the sound of Wilson's laughter – loud, healthy, and _strong_ – wash over him.

* * *

_Fin_


End file.
